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Public housing in the United States and Canada

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In the United States and Canada, public housing is usually a block of purpose-built housing operated by a government agency, often simply referred to as "the projects".

History

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, government involvement in housing for the poor was chiefly in the area of requiring new buildings to meet certain standards - like having airshafts - for decent livability.

Most housing communities developed from the 1930s onward under the auspices of the housing division of the Public Works Administration and, after 1937, the United States Housing Authority created by the Wagner-Steagall Housing Act. Most of the initial public housing could be considered slum clearance; there wasn't a national initiative in place to build housing for the poor and so the number of units didn't increase. This helped ease the concerns of a health-conscious public by eliminating or altering neighborhoods commonly considered dangerous, and reflected progressive-era sanitation initiatives. However, the advent of make-shift tent communities during the Great Depression caused concern in the Administration. Franklin Delano Roosevelt wrote in 1938, "Today, we are launching an attack on the slums of this country."

A housing project in Asheville, North Carolina

Public housing in its earliest decades was usually much more working-class and middle-class and white than it was by the 1960s and after. Many Americans associate large, multi-story towers with public housing, but early projects, like the Ida B. Wells projects in Chicago, were actually low-rise, though Le Corbusier superblocks caught on before World War II, as seen in the (union built) Penn South houses in New York.

What Kenneth T. Jackson and other historians have called the "ghettofication" of public housing occurred for several reasons. One reason was the general weakening of the urban working classes. By the late 1950s the reservoir of needy working class urban dwellers was simply smaller than it had been previously.

Other reasons for the ghettofication of public housing can be attributed to broad public policy decisions. Federal law required that no person could pay more than a quarter of his or her income for rent in public housing. Since middle class people would pay as much, or more, for rent in public housing as they would in superior private housing, middle class people had no incentive to live in public housing at all. Another public policy factor that led to the decline in public housing was that, in general, city housing agencies ceased to screen tenants (New York City was an exception). In the 1940s, some public housing agencies, such as the Chicago Housing Authority under Elizabeth Wood, would only accept married tenants and gave special benefits to war veterans.

Deterioration

Public housing was only built with the blessing of the local government. Hence, unlike France, projects were almost never built on suburban greenfields. Usually projects were built in older neighborhoods, whose old housing was demolished to make way for them. The destruction of tenements and eviction of their low-income residents consistently created problems in nearby neighborhoods with "soft" real estate markets.

The destruction of deteriorating buildings to make room for public housing often created problems in adjacent neighborhoods. An excellent example of this phenomenon can be found in Brooklyn. When blocks of slums in the Brownsville district were cleared to make room for public housing in the 1950s, thousands of displaced families moved into the neighboring district of East New York, which at that time was a predominantly white, middle-class area with a stable economy. The sudden influx of large, lower-income black and Hispanic families from Brownsville strained the physical and social services of the community. A mass exodus of the white population began (see white flight). Within six years a healthy community became one of the most decayed and dangerous neighborhoods in the United States. A similar situation occurred when Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania attempted to tear down public housing in the Polish Hill area to make way for a Civic Arena. (Crabgrass Frontier, 229)

Currently

Houses, apartments or other residential units are usually subsidized on a rent-geared-to-income (RGI) basis. Some communities have now embraced a mixed income, with both assisted and market rents, when allocating homes as they become available. The use of Low Income Housing Tax Credits have been used to create mixed income units.

In recent years, many such projects have been torn down, renovated or replaced after criticism that the concentration of poverty in economically depressed areas, inadequate management of the buildings, and government indifference have contributed to increased crime. U.S. public housing continues to have a reputation for violence, drug use, and prostitution, leading to the passage, in 1996, of a federal "one strike you're out" law, calling for the eviction of project tenants whose housing units are the scene of certain types of criminal activity, especially that which is drug-related.

The Metropolitan areas with largest providers of North American public housing are (Estimates):

In reaction to the problems surrounding public housing, the US Congress passed legislation enacting the Section 8 Housing Program in 1974, which Richard Nixon signed into law, to encourage the private sector to construct affordable homes. This kind of housing assistance assists poor tenants by giving a monthly subsidy to their landlords. This assistance can be 'project based,' which applies to specific properties, or 'tenant based,' which provides tenants with a voucher they can use anywhere vouchers are accepted. Virtually no new project based Section 8 housing has been produced since 1983. Effective October 1, 1999, existing tenant based voucher programs were merged into the Housing Choice Voucher Program, which is today the primary means of providing subsidies to low income renters. The George W. Bush Administration has recently proposed controversial changes to the Housing Choice Voucher Program.

Some United States public housing developments

Alabama

Arkansas

  • North Little Rock
    • Shorter Garden
    • Eastgate Terrace
    • Silver City Court
    • Windemere
    • Hemlock Courts

California

  • Oakland
    • Acorn Housing Project
    • Echo Creek
    • 65-69 Village
  • San Francisco
    • Hunters Point
    • Hunters View Dwellings
    • Sunnydale
    • Alice Griffith "Double Rock" Projects
    • Potrero Hill
    • Geneva Towers
    • Ping Yuen Projects
    • Robert Pitts Homes (Yerba Buena Plaza West)
    • Westbrook Apartments
    • Diamand Heights Dwellings
    • Valencia Gardens
    • Friendship village
    • Marcus Garvey Projects
    • Martin Luther King Courts
    • Bernal Dwellings
    • JFK Towers
    • Holly Courts
    • Clementina Towers
    • Oakdale Projects
    • Heritage Homes (Geneva Towers)
    • Britton Homes (Geneva Towers)
    • North Beach Place
    • Alemany Homes
    • Westside Courts
    • Plaza East
    • Hayes Valley

Connecticut

  • Danbury
    • Laurel Gardens
    • High Ridge Gardens
    • Beaver Street
    • Eden Drive

Florida

Georgia

Illinois

Indiana

Kentucky

Louisiana

Maryland

Massachusetts

Michigan


Minnesota

Missouri

Nebraska

New Jersey

New York

Ohio

Pennsylvania

The Housing Authority of the City of Pittsburgh built some of the first public housing in the United States. It is being transformed by the HOPE VI program throughout the City. A report released on September 13, 2005 by the Brookings Institution (www.brookings.edu/metro/pubs/PittsburghCaseStudy.pdf)has deemed the HOPE VI program in the Manchester neighborhood of Pittsburgh a success in transforming the public housing there as well as being a catalyst for revitalizing the entire neighborhood.

See also: Public housing in Philadelphia

Puerto Rico

Main article: Public housing in Puerto Rico

Rhode Island

PAWTUCKET Prospect Heights

Texas

  • Austin
    • Santa Rita Courts (the nation's first public housing built under the 1937 U.S. Housing Act
    • Rosewood Courts (built for African-Americans)
    • Chalmers Courts (built for Whites)
    • Meadowbrook
    • Booker T. Washington (Austin's largest public housing complex)

Virginia

Washington

Washington, DC

Canadian public housing projects

British Columbia

Manitoba

Nova Scotia

In more recent decades MRHA, the metro housing authority, has built smaller developments integrated into existing neighbourhoods. These are, individually, not notable enough to be included in this list.

Ontario

Quebec

External links

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